S. Korea, US, Japan vow 'maximum pressure' on N. Korea for dialogue

South Korea, the United States and Japan agreed Wednesday to continue joint efforts to put "maximum pressure" on North Korea in order to bring it to the negotiating table, the Korean news agency Yonhap reported.

The three countries strongly condemned the North's launch last week of a ballistic missile with intercontinental range during a video conference of their defense officials, according to the South's Ministry of National Defense.

It was meant to share information on the latest provocation and discuss countermeasures.

They pointed out that the July 4 missile firing was in clear violation of multiple UN Security Council resolutions imposing sanctions on Pyongyang and emphasized the communist regime's development of weapons of mass destruction poses a grave threat to global peace and stability, the ministry said.

The regional powers reaffirmed the importance of coordination to achieve the "complete and irreversible" denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and coax the North into halting provocations and returning to dialogue.

South Korea was represented by Chang Kyung-soo, acting chief of the ministry's policy planning office. His counterparts were David F. Helvey, U.S. assistant secretary of defense for Asian and Pacific security affairs, and Satoshi Maeda, director general for Japan's defense policy.

Source: MENA